2010 Chevy Camaro Throttle Body Intake Test

How much air can an intake take if an intake could take air?

It’s a question as old as hot rodding itself. Is bigger always better? Can the factory equipment support similar power to the aftermarket in certain situations? Does something automatically suck because it doesn’t gain a million horsepower for little to no cost even when installed on the wrong application? No, Yes, and No are the answers to those three questions, and this article is a great way to explore those concepts and more. If you’ve been following along with our 2010 Camaro project, you have no doubt been itching to hear the results of our RHS Pro Elite LS7 cylinder head install. For those of you not up to speed (it has been a while, honestly) the car in question is AntiVenom’s test Camaro, which sports a Futral 228/242 duration camshaft, a set of RHS LS7 Pro Elite cylinder heads, and a slew of bolt-on parts. Wearing a FAST LSXR 102mm intake manifold, the combination laid down a stout 486.20-rwhp and 426.08 lb-ft of torque, which felt strong on the street through the HammerHead 12-bolt rear end and large 20-inch rollers.

The question then, for the sake of science, was whether a large 102mm intake manifold was truly aiding in power production on our "little 376 cubic-inch mill or merely just free flowing air hoping for a larger displacement engine or some boost to find its way into the engine bay. Said another way, we wondered if the "too big” 102 was possibly hurting power production as we had read on the interwebs. We had our theories, as we are sure you have yours, but nothing says GMHTP like hitting the dyno to find out what’s what. And with our RHS heads capable of running a stock LS7 intake manifold, we had the perfect comparison intake in mind. Built by GM for the awesome LS7 found in the current C6 Z06, the LS7 intake is a work of airflow engineered art and is capable of supporting over 505hp in stock form. Its three-piece friction welded composite shell features a 90mm intake opening and was designed by GM specifically for broad power production on the 427 cubic-inch LS7 engine. Compared to the gorgeous aftermarket offerings from FAST, it isn’t nearly as robust or beautiful (depending on who you ask), but would headroom matter to our heads/cam 376? Only one way to find out...